If you wish to mount the camera in portrait orientation at the NPP without modifiying the dovetail clamp or the camera rail then the dimension from the base of the camera to the centre of the lens mount, must be 40mm or less, AND the diameter of the lens barrel must be 80mm or less.

If you are planning to shoot relatively distant outdoor scenes - where nothing in the scene is within say 100m - with long focal length lenses, then mounting at the NPP is irrelevant and it's more important to mount the camera/lens combination close to the centre of mass.

What len(es) did you plan to use?

How did you plan to control the mount - with Papywizard (if so which platform/OS), with Panoshoot, with the T&C Touch controller?

Robotic pano heads, with shooting position recording, such as the Panogear (or the higher performance and cost Panonned and Seitz VRDrive) come into their own when you are shooting withn longer focal length stnadrd/rectinear lenses when you may need to shoot many tens or hundreds of images to cover your desired field of view - typicallya partial pano with a field of view of considerably less than 360 x 180 dgrees.

The shooting positions recording can be used later when stitching with APP/APG (or PTGui) to help the stitcher place 'featureless' images that would otherwise be left out of the stitch.

You're right. I buy a Nodal ninja to make a Virual tours and a Fisheye lens to D6.The second lens will be able to make a gigapanoramas with robotic panohead. What a len I must have to make an optimal gigapanoramas, which is the best?btw. When I want to buy a maual Panohead what are the differences by Nodal Ninja 4 and e.g. Ultimate M1-L?

Last edited by martinii007 on Mon Jul 22, 2013 9:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

martinii007 wrote:You're right. I buy a Nodal ninja to make a Virual tours and a Fisheye lens to D6.

OK. You may wish to check out the Bushman Gobi manual pano head that Kolor is now offering too.

The second lens will be able to make a gigapanoramas with robotic panohead. What a len I must have to make an optimal gigapanoramas, which is the best?

What is an 'optimal gigapanorama'?

A prime lens, not a zoom, for start. Then it just depends on the resolution of panoramic image you wish to produce really, the longer the focal length the higher the res. of the stitched pano....but the shooting phase though often challenging is nothing like as challenging as the processing - you need powerful hardware to handle very high res. panos and the process becomes exponentially more difficult as focal length increases.

btw. When I want to buy a manual Panohead what are the differences by Nodal Ninja 4 and e.g. Ultimate M1-L?

IMO the Ultimate would be 'overkill' for use solely with a Canon 6D and and Samyang 8mm fisheye, in fact some would say the NN4 is rather 'more' than you need too.But if you have money burning a hole in your pocket...

I wouldn't bother with the leveller. You can quite easily level a tripod more or less manually and easily level a pano in APP/APG. A tripod with a levelling centre column would be more useful than the NN Leveller IMO.

If you are only going to shoot with a fisheye then the R-D16 is overkill but for some reason NN don't offer the NN4 with an R-Dx rotator with fewer click stop options these days. There used to be an R-D8 but they don't offer the NN4 with the R-D5 as far as I know (that is if the R-D5 is even compatible with the NN4).

To my D6 are to Ninja 4 also Camera plates?

I don't understand the question.

I see that, you have a SIGMA 8mm F/3.5 Fish Eye len. Are large differences between Sigma 8mm lens and Samyang 8mm?

Yes, they are very different 'beasts' - the Sigma produces a cropped circular image on cropped sensor , the Samyang produces a fullframe fisheye image on a cropped sensor. The Sigma is also MUCH more expensive. The Samyang is a fully manual lense too on the Canon body.

martinii007 wrote:At the moment I'm beginner but I want to make professional panorama's and virtual Tours's. That I want to have a professional equipment.

What you think about my "virtual-tour" and "panorama" equipment?

1. Full frame camera Canon 6D

Good.

2. NN4 with rotator and nadir adapter

OK. That's with the R-D16 rotator?

3. Sigma len 8mm F3,5 EX DG Fisheye

Not with a fullframe camera - sorry I'd not spotted that 6D is fullframe before, being a 'dumb' Nikon shooter. You would be better off with the 'old' Canon 15mm fisheye if you can find one, or the new Canon 8-15mm zoom fisheye, or the Signma 15mm fisheye. Sigma 8mm produces a full circular image ona full frame sensor and 'wastes' a lot of pixels.

Only if you wish to have an Arca Swiss compatible quick release on the upper arm of the NN4.

In which case you need two parts:

1. A camera-specific compatible plate to go on the camara - and I belive that the one you linked to is not the correct plate, in fact NN don't yet specififcally list a plate for the D6 - you'd need to contact them for advice.

8mm on a fullframe Canon 6D? this gives you only small (less Pixels) final panos. I would pickup a 15-25mm lens (no zoom, fix focal, Fisheye or no fisheye....).85mm as second lens? no this gives you gigapixel Panoramas you've no practise with. (Manual head & gigapanos... pain, merlin & gigapanos may work if you modify the merlins crow to get perfect NPP, so for gigapixel panos I would tend to go pr Quality like seitz head, panoneed in the 2-3Kâ‚¬ class or even some more expensive head in the +3Kâ‚¬ class) I would pickup the Canon EF 24-70mm f 2.8L II - USM. this lens you can Keep with you even if you upgrade your Body in 1-3 years...

Georg

Last edited by gkaefer on Tue Jul 23, 2013 7:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Can you tell us more about the sort of panos you hope to shoot and whether this is to be a hobby or a commercial activity?THis information might lead me to suggest additional items for your list.Do you already have the Canon 6D?

When I buy all elements I want to learn and offer commercial virtual tours and panorama's.I have not bought yet Canon 6D but I want to have a FF Camera. I read a lot of opinion that this Camera is very good and better than 5D mkII.

Last edited by martinii007 on Wed Jul 24, 2013 11:56 am, edited 1 time in total.

Can you tell us more about the sort of panos you hope to shoot and whether this is to be a hobby or a commercial activity?THis information might lead me to suggest additional items for your list.Do you already have the Canon 6D?

When I buy all elements I want to learn and offer commercial virtual tours and panorama's.I have not bought yet Canon 6D but I want to have a FF Camera. I read a lot of opinion that this Camera is very good and better than 5D mkII.

You are going to be spending a lot of money on a speculative venture.

Many have tried and failed to make a decent return on real estate panos and tours.

I hope you have done your marketing research, budgeting and business planning thoroughly.

martinii007 wrote:When I buy all elements I want to learn and offer commercial virtual tours and panorama's.

I *strongly* suggest to learn about the basics of commercial panorama-photography BEFORE buying equipment.

martinii007 wrote:I have not bought yet Canon 6D but I want to have a FF Camera. I read a lot of opinion that this Camera is very good and better than 5D mkII.

A FF-camera definitely is preferable for commercial use. I use a 5D2 for about 3 years now - itÂ´s an excellent workhorse.The 5D3 is better in terms of dynamic - but in my eyes ways too expensive just for panorama-shooting. IÂ´m gonna switch to a Nikon D800 these days . . iÂ´m using Nikon-primes anyway.

I donÂ´t know the 6D.

If you want to do more than fisheye panos of 6 or 8 shots - definitely preferable the 15mm or 8-15mm Canon fisheyes - and enter the hires world you need to know some facts:

1) You NEED a "robotic" head writing xml files.2) You NEED real good lenses - i suggest primes, no zooms.3) You NEED a VERY good tripod - weÂ´re entering a region *starting* from about 300.- here.4) Yue NEED a VERY capable computer - many starters completely under-estimate this fact.

LetÂ´s see:

Camera, Fisheye and two good primes for gigapixels (say: 85mm and 300mm) = around 6000.-â‚¬.Computable head writing xml incl. controller: starting from 2000.-â‚¬ +VATVery sturdy tripod *starting* from about 300/400.-â‚¬Computer/display/add-ons i guess in the PC-DIY-range and capable of gigapixel-panos a good start is around 3-4000.-â‚¬

So - and thatÂ´s just an optimistic guessing - in terms of commercially producing panoramas/gigapixels weÂ´re talking about an investment of around 10-12000.-â‚¬, including several helpful gadgets i didnÂ´t mention here.

But first of all you need SKILLS and KNOWLEDGE.

Without having plenty of technical skills and theoretical knowledge AND being experienced in photography AND in marketing yourself as a panorama-producer . . . . you most likely will burn much money.

Take this as a friendly advise from a pro instead of feeling insulted please (i encountered that sometimes . . :rolleyes:).

best and good luck, Klaus

PS: 75% of running this business sucessfully isnÂ´t related to cameras, lenses and gadgets at all . . . . :cool:

Last edited by klausesser on Wed Jul 24, 2013 12:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I will not ofer only virtual tour's. This will be an option of many other's services

Thank all users for quick reply's and suggestions and sorry for my English (I learn)

When I started I want to make only virtual tour's. First I must have a professional equipment, than I sign up for the course: how to make virtual tours.When will my business succeed I buy equipment for gigapanorama's.

At the moment I please user's to make a list of professional equipment...I wrote one more times my list:

mediavets wrote:You have forgotten the pano head - it was to be an NN4 with R-D16 and nadir adapter I believe, and possibly a camera-specific Arca Swiss compatible QR.

YES of course

What you think about this equipment to make virtual tours, scale from 1-10?

I'd give it at least an 8, and I'd be very envious.

Why an 8? Some would opt for a more expensive tripod perhaps, and some might opt for adding a Promote Control for even more extstive expsoure bracketing.

Although not absolutely required for VTs I'd like to add a wide angle rectilinear lens if I was going to do a lot of real estate work; even with VTs you don't always want to offer a full 360x180 ,say, a small ensuite shower room a regular wide angle single image willconvey enough info, and same approch canm be useful to highlight features within a larger space..

That depends on two things......size of the pano's a 30.000 x 24.000 pano can be made using a good tele and a middle of the road computer. But that is not Gigapano but is still printable at 720 Gpixel about the resolution of an 8 x 10 inch camera and define a printsize of 100 inch or 2 x 2,5 meters (big enough I should say). And time willing to sit stairing at a progres bar.....now and that depends on wether you do this as an artform (as I am willing to) or as a commercial enterprise.....commercial implies deadline, deadline + slow equipment + errors and try-outs implies stress, stress implies an early grave,. death by pano so to speak. If you wanna go to 2 to 50 and even 350 Gpixels (and I still have to find the point in doing so) obviously you need a maxed out computer (and maxed out everything else including easily forgotten SKILLLLLL).

If you are new act new. Learn first, buy later. It makes no sence to buy a 4000 dollar + rodeon (or even a 3000 dollar+ Panoneed) if you have no clue for what you are gonna use it. Shooting Pano's is about as complex and wide a field as is photography itself.

>You NEED a "robotic" head writing xml files<Yeps Klaus, but the .xml can be faked if you know how you shot the pano manually (degrees per step horizontal, degrees per step vertical, number of shots horizontal, number of shots vertical and of cause the most important variable the focal lengt used, and last but not least the steps HDR that were used)......but that requires some knowledge about .xml files and the way Kolor interprets them and is far from easy, nor is shooting a 30.000 x 24.000 picture using a manual head a comfortable affair (very, very exhausting work due to the concentration involved). So I'm currently writing (wenn die Affenhitze nachlest ) a .xml part in my code and I'm building my own head (with a little help in the hardware department).

2) You NEED real good lenses - i suggest primes, no zooms.3) You NEED a VERY good tripod - weÂ´re entering a region *starting* from about 300.- here.

No argument there.....but you don't have to buy AF lenses as well. In fact Klaus I guess you use manual focus lenses quite often (Nikon on Canon as I recall). That sure saves money since good quality manual glass can be bought a rock bottom prices.

About the FF-ness....well some gigapans are made with 7D's and as memory serves the London 360 pano is made with this APS-H camera.....simply because a smaller sensor "extends" the lenses (and also extends the DOF) which makes gear lighter at the same magnification.

But FF sensors have something ahead, a bit more bitdepth which gives much nicer color rendition.

Greets, Ed.

P.S. My advice.......buy a good manual head first and learn the basics of VR spheres and Gigapano's and let investment and ambition grow together with experience, knowledge and skill. Used to play guitar and thought a 5000 dollar guitar and a 3000 dollar amp would turn me into Carlos Santana.......it did not, I played just as bad, and sold the whole #### at rockbottom prices, frustrated......auwch....

>even with VTs you don't always want to offer a full 360x180 ,say, a small ensuite shower room a regular wide angle single image willconvey enough info<

Very wise spoken Andrew, with a single shot you are able to COMPOSE a picture and that means leaving out the not so starteling parts of a room. And sometime in order to present something you don't really want the deep honnesty and degree of intamecy a VR sphere creates. It an imersive but also invasive and revealing art. Home owners (and home sellers) have to keep that in mind. A good panographer knows when he or she adds to the salebility and when he substracts. Have seen more then my share of appartments and believe me not all them were instantly sellable via VR.

That depends on two things......size of the pano's a 30.000 x 24.000 pano can be made using a good tele and a middle of the road computer. But that is not Gigapano but is still printable at 720 Gpixel about the resolution of an 8 x 10 inch camera and define a printsize of 100 inch or 2 x 2,5 meters (big enough I should say). And time willing to sit stairing at a progres bar.....now and that depends on wether you do this as an artform (as I am willing to) or as a commercial enterprise.....commercial implies deadline, deadline + slow equipment + errors and try-outs implies stress, stress implies an early grave,. death by pano so to speak. If you wanna go to 2 to 50 and even 350 Gpixels (and I still have to find the point in doing so) obviously you need a maxed out computer (and maxed out everything else including easily forgotten SKILLLLLL).

If you are new act new. Learn first, buy later. It makes no sence to buy a 4000 dollar + rodeon (or even a 3000 dollar+ Panoneed) if you have no clue for what you are gonna use it. Shooting Pano's is about as complex and wide a field as is photography itself.

>You NEED a "robotic" head writing xml files<Yeps Klaus, but the .xml can be faked if you know how you shot the pano manually (degrees per step horizontal, degrees per step vertical, number of shots horizontal, number of shots vertical and of cause the most important variable the focal lengt used, and last but not least the steps HDR that were used)......but that requires some knowledge about .xml files and the way Kolor interprets them and is far from easy, nor is shooting a 30.000 x 24.000 picture using a manual head a comfortable affair (very, very exhausting work due to the concentration involved). So I'm currently writing (wenn die Affenhitze nachlest ) a .xml part in my code and I'm building my own head (with a little help in the hardware department).

2) You NEED real good lenses - i suggest primes, no zooms.3) You NEED a VERY good tripod - weÂ´re entering a region *starting* from about 300.- here.

No argument there.....but you don't have to buy AF lenses as well. In fact Klaus I guess you use manual focus lenses quite often (Nikon on Canon as I recall). That sure saves money since good quality manual glass can be bought a rock bottom prices.

About the FF-ness....well some gigapans are made with 7D's and as memory serves the London 360 pano is made with this APS-H camera.....simply because a smaller sensor "extends" the lenses (and also extends the DOF) which makes gear lighter at the same magnification.

But FF sensors have something ahead, a bit more bitdepth which gives much nicer color rendition.

Greets, Ed.

P.S. My advice.......buy a good manual head first and learn the basics of VR spheres and Gigapano's and let investment and ambition grow together with experience, knowledge and skill. Used to play guitar and thought a 5000 dollar guitar and a 3000 dollar amp would turn me into Carlos Santana.......it did not, I played just as bad, and sold the whole #### at rockbottom prices, frustrated......auwch....